Turns out, most people actually like Obamacare, once they understand what it actually is and want to keep the individual provisions of it. As the reality of what the Republicans are proposing comes to light, Trump voters (and others) are rightly terrified and mighty angry that they’re going to lose the provisions of Obamacare and will have to pay more for less, or lose coverage all together, for many a life and death event.
The current iteration of the GOP is many things, but at it’s core it’s supposed to be a pro-business party. I often wonder why a universal healthcare plan hasn’t been a plank of the GOP for decades?
A good universal healthcare plan in the U.S. would cause an explosion of entrepreneurship. How much money are we losing by propping up medical insurance and big pharma industries at the expense of the rest of the economy?
Universal healthcare is clearly pro-business. Medicare (government administered healthcare) has an overhead cost of about 1 percent vs. 20 percent that private for-profit medical insurance has.
We’ve heard the Republican talking points, objections and the nightmare stories of long lines, “rationing,” poor service, lack of innovation, reduced research and development, etc. in countries with “socialized” medicine. If we chose to have universal healthcare, why on earth wouldn’t it be better?
And to say we don’t have rationing here in the U.S. is just plain wrong – it’s “financial” rationing. That’s what Republicans call “access.” You may have “access” to a yacht dealer. Does that mean you have a yacht?
If “socialized” services necessarily meant a lack of research and development and innovation, as many Republicans claim, why aren’t our fire services still using horse-drawn, man-powered pumper trucks? They’re “socialized” after all, meaning they’re taxpayer funded and government-run services. The fact that our first responders, fireman, EMTs, etc., have modern, capable equipment and training proves that a “socialized” service can be efficient, have cutting-edge equipment and that R & D and innovation has, and will continue to happen.
Finally, linkage. If we had a taxpayer-funded universal healthcare system, then we’d be all over the causes of costly illnesses. That’s how the market would work. We’d ask why are there more than 78 million obese Americans and how much is that costing us? We’d see that our food supply maybe isn’t the healthiest, we’d see how much we pay to grow those non-healthy foods. We might stop subsidizing corn as much and start subsidizing other vegetables.
Heart disease, cancer, diabetes, etc., all of the causes of those diseases would be examined and we’d take steps to end them, not just treat them, because it will cost less. That’s the linkage that would follow the money of a taxpayer-funded system.
Finally, we know our elected representatives do certain things as a prerequisite to going to Washington. One sure way to guarantee that any universal healthcare plan would be the best in the world would be to require all elected representatives in Washington, as well as every cabinet member or government appointee, to have the same coverage as a retired coal miner in West Virginia, a ranch hand in Montana, farm worker in California or any other average American.
That would make our medical coverage the best in the world. So why isn’t this a Republican position?
Tom Finnegan
Sharpsburg, Ga.
